Linguistic accompaniment of information warfare (based on the Russian-Ukrainian armed conflict)

Abstract

(en) Language is an important means of waging an information war. The study of linguistic units, through which each of the parties to the armed conflict affects the recipients, makes it possible to model a fragment of the language picture of the world of society forced to live in war. Often this picture is formed under the influence of the mass media and social networks. In this paper, the associative-semantic field “enemy” in the context of the Russian-Ukrainian armed confrontation is structured on the basis of the language units used by Ukrainian information resources. Particular attention is paid to the peculiarities of the associative-semantic group (ASG) “enemy media”, which include three microgroups (ASmG) with core lexemes “mass media”, “journalists”, “phenomena”. The constituents of ASmG “mass media” are divided into semantic rows: associations that reveal the Russian affiliation of information resources (Russia- media, Putin-TV); lexemes that indicate the propagandistic nature of the media (information Spetsnaz); lexemes to denote the harmfulness of actions (to sow confusion, to lie through one’s teeth). The components of ASmG “journalists” are lexemes that indicate the privilege of individual employees of the media industry (generals of information troops) and their financial interest (millionaires from TV). ASmG “phenomena” combines terms formed from the names of famous journalists (Kyselov – kyselovshchyna, Skabeieva – skabeievshchyna), as well as phraseological units that appeared as a result of the Russian media spreading false or manipulative information (crucified boy, into radioactive ash).